Mr. Gibb (2006)

A unpopular high school teacher turns his life around after a student is kidnapped.

Director:

David Ostry

Writer:

Adam Targum (screenplay)

Stars:

Tim Daly, Hayden Panettiere, William Sadler

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Tim Daly	...	Ronald Gibb
Hayden Panettiere	...	Ally Palmer
William Sadler	...	Phil Palmer
Dan Hedaya	...	Gabe
Paula Devicq	...	Holly
Lisa Lynds	...	Tiff
Sarah Steele	...	Amber
John Gallagher Jr.	...	Brett Mullen
Mark Kassen	...	Pete Macauley
Brian Anthony Wilson	...	Detective Dick Moon
Andrew Benator	...	Kari
Rita Gardner	...	Marge Whitman
Maureen Mueller	...	Evelyn Hirsch
Darrell James	...	Bartender (as Darrell Jones)
Matthew Lawler	...	Unit Cop 1

Storyline

Ron Gibb is a widower, solitary and depressed, teaching history at an upstate New York high school. He has a small crush on Ally, a cheerleader, which is noticed by another student and the janitor. After Ally breaks up with her boyfriend, Ron drops her off at home, and a few minutes later she's kidnapped. The police are alternately suspicious of Ron and baffled because there's no ransom demand. Her father, a used car salesman, turns it into a sales event. Ron confronts Ally's dad over his business practices and offers his own reward for her return. Who has her, and why? And will Ron eventually notice a neighbor who's been trying to get his attention?

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Plot Keywords:

high school teacher | high school | teacher | student | gettysburg address | 

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Taglines:

Scandal is her best subject.

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Genres:

Comedy

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for sexual content and language

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

January 2006 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Good Student

Filming Locations:

Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Screen Media Ventures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

90 min 81 min (Starz)

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Did You Know?

Goofs

Hallway student (Tom Bunker) is seen walking down the hall as Mr. Gibb walks by and acknowledges him. Split scene right after that you can see the hallway student again leaning up against a locker as Mr. Gibb goes by talking to one of the teachers.

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Quotes

Honest Phil Palmer: Next time take a dump on my face!

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Connections

References The 8th Sin (2004)

User Reviews

Black comedy in the spirit of "Election"

This black comedy, kind of in the spirit of "Election", was only released on DVD several years after it was made and under the misleading title "The Good Student". It's a rare movie that instead of having a traditional hero, has more of a flawed "anti-hero", an unpopular high-school teacher (Tim Daly), who is as absorbed in his rather boring subject (US history) as any high-school teacher, but also harbors a not-so-hidden crush on one of his female students (Hayden Pantierre--I suppose it's kind of hard to blame him there though). After he gives her an ill-advised ride home and ends up kissing her, she mysteriously disappears, and he finds himself the prime suspect.

The movie stacks the deck here quite a bit by casting the good-looking and fairly young Daly in the role and also giving him a very attractive love interest more his own age (Paula Devocq). It would have been a lot more brave to cast a guy who LOOKS like a lecherous middle-age creep. He's also seems relatively noble compared to all the other characters in the movie--like the missing girls' father (William Sandler), a car salesman who seems to be using his daughter's disappearance to bolster his business, a cop (Dan Hedaya), who is both overzealous and incompetent, and another female student (Sarah Steele), who mocks "Mr. Gibbs" for his attraction to the missing girl and his interest in "barely-legal" porn, but who turns out to have her own "Lolita" thing going on. The worst perhaps though is a sleazy fellow teacher who confides that he is exchanging grades for sex with his female students.

This movie perpetuates the rather tiresome Hollywood myth that very many high-school teachers are, or would even want to, mess around with their students. Of course, not too many high-school students look like Pantierre, or even Steele. (Interestingly, Hayden Pantierre WAS high-school age when she made this movie, but she definitely doesn't look it. Steele, on the other hand, had played one of the more believable teen characters a few years earlier in "Spanglish" when she was in her "awkward years", but those years were obviously well behind her by this time). Like "Election", this movie does have some effective black comedy and satire, but it is a much more hit-and-miss affair. The movie also has a really great ending, but perhaps it is a little too subtle or ambiguous for many people to appreciate. All in all, this isn't a bad movie though.